


As the Clock Strikes the Hour

by TheSilverPhoenix



Series: Hetalia Monday Challenge [3]
Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Alternate Universe - Victorian, Angst, Depression, F/F, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Inspired by Alice in Wonderland, Inspired by Alice: the Madness Returns, Mental Health Issues, Nyotalia, Psychological Trauma, hetalia monday challenge, quote prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-15
Updated: 2020-12-15
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:08:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,362
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28079688
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSilverPhoenix/pseuds/TheSilverPhoenix
Summary: Alice Kirkland wasn't crazy or mad. All she wanted to do was remember. And sometimes, even that was too much.
Relationships: America/England (Hetalia)
Series: Hetalia Monday Challenge [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2043730
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	As the Clock Strikes the Hour

The most maddening thing about her therapy sessions was the clock. Even after she had leaned back into the chaise and closed her eyes to block out the rest of the plush office, the incessant ticking of the gears as they spun to keep time cut through any distraction she could conjure up. Even when the voice of the doctor appeared to guide her through her memories, it remained in the background. A constant reminder of each second that passed.

_ Tick tock. _

It was a never-ending reminder of how much time had truly passed in her life. Short on a comparative scale, just over twenty-two years, but she felt like she had already lived through hundreds of lifetimes. There was a weight on her very soul that she tried desperately to shake off time and time again, but instead, it clung on like a parasite. Sucking away at her, but leaving behind just enough sanity for her to be considered ‘alive’.

_ Tick tock. _

Again with the noise. It grounded her in a painful reality and forced her into an existence she did not want.

“Concentrate, Alice,” came the doctor’s voice, pulling her from the downwards spiral she had been caught in. “You must first remember what to forget if you want to forget. Now, tell me about your dreams of this ‘Wonderland’.”

Alice tried to relax where she was laying, but she couldn’t. Something vicious in her reared its ugly head at the slightest mention of Wonderland, though whether it sought its destruction or protection she didn’t know. Any mention of Wonderland at the asylum would’ve seen her strapped back into a jacket with the nurses muttering irritably that it was ‘back to square one’. Now the doctor was asking her about it. Should she answer him honestly? Should she tell him of the dreams she found frequenting more and more about Wonderland? How the land has grown poisonous and rotten or how its residence had fallen into madness and delusion, more so than they already had? Or how her visits consisted of blood-soaked clothing and rivers of gore and flesh and how she didn’t know how to save it any more than she knew how to save herself? And how the dreams had slowly bleed more and more into reality as the time had passed? Flying mint bunnies zooming around the walls of the rooms and giant, fantastical mushrooms and fauna growing amongst the streets and buildings in the heart of London.

_ Tick tock. _

No. No, she shouldn’t. Doing so would ensure her ticket back to the asylum. Back to the cruel nurses and the colorless rooms and the pained, maniacal screams of the patients waking her in the dead of night. Back to the fear and panic and doubt that maybe she  _ was _ crazy and maybe she  _ did _ deserve to be there.

“Alice,” came the doctor’s voice again, this time more forceful. “Tell me about Wonderland.”

_ Tick tock. _

Alice didn’t trust the doctor. She didn’t trust anyone who claimed that they could help or make her better or help her forget the trauma of her past. Part of her didn’t want to forget. Because forgetting would mean confronting that what had happened was real and that the only person she  _ had _ trusted with everything was  _ gone _ .

And it would mean forgetting her.

Forgetting the Wonderland they’d built and the Wonderland that had twisted and warped itself into something unrecognizable after she had gone.

_ Tick tock. _

Alice didn’t want to forget.

Tears stung at the back of her eyes and she forced them away. Tears would get her nowhere. She had shed enough of them to know that. Pain, sorrow, heartbreak. No one had looked on at her with sympathy since her family had carted her away to that dreaded place, and no one would again. The last time she’d seen any warm emotion towards her own person, it had been encompassed by glittering blue eyes and accompanied by a brilliant smile that had always made her heart stutter in her chest. Now all that was left was the cold, steady, merciless beating of a hollow organ that was simply doing its job to keep her alive. And just as the clock on the wall kept time, her heart ticked away at the seconds of her life. One she secretly hoped was close to its end. For, unlike a clock, a heart could not be rewound.

_ Tick tock. Thump thump. _

“You can run, but you can’t escape,” the doctor’s voice spoke. The threatening words were disguised as advice and she didn’t know what to make of them. “Not from this. The past cannot be changed and events cannot be redone. We must shake off those memories and discard them. They are useless to us now and clinging to them will only hurt you more. You must forget, Alice. You must forget everything.”

_ Tick tock. Thump thump. _

The idea made bile sting her throat. Was clinging to the past hurting her? Was desperately trying to remember the love she felt when she’d been happy actually killing her? Surely not. Alice couldn’t bear the thought of Amelia’s memory doing her any harm. Amelia. Her dear Amelia.

_ Tick tock. Thump thump. _

Tears ran down her face, as much as she tried to stop them, and Alice quickly wiped them away. She wouldn’t allow the doctor to see her like this. She wouldn’t allow him to touch the memory she’d fought too hard to preserve in the asylum. She’d already given them so much of what she’d had. All of the medication and treatments and procedures had slowly chipped away at her until Amelia had been nothing more than a blurred outline. A fragment of a memory.

But she could still remember her eyes and her smile and her warmth and brightness and love and she couldn’t let them take that. She couldn’t. She couldn’t.

_ Tick tock. Thump thump. _

Alice felt as if she was being torn in two - stuck between losing herself in the memories she had and the stoic mask she wanted to portray. The wrong emotion could send her back and she didn’t want to go back because she knew she wouldn’t survive. She’d lose herself more than she already had and what little memory she could remember would be destroyed. Amelia would be destroyed.

_ Tick tock. Thump thump. _

The sound of the clock was too loud now, and out of sync with the beat of her racing heart.

“Alice,” came the stern, disapproving voice. It sent dread through her.

She wasn’t mad. She didn’t deserve to go back. Didn’t want to go back. Didn’t want to forget.

_ BONG. _

The clock’s deep gong rang out the hour and the sound sent a wave of relief through Alice. The session was over and the danger had passed. For now.

Alice opened her eyes and blinked as her sight adjusted to the sunlight. She avoided the doctor’s glare and brushed a nonexistent wrinkle from her skirts.

“Quite a disappointing session today, I must say,” the doctor said, lips curling around his pipe as he jotted some words down in the journal on his desk. “I expected more from you.”

He finished writing down his thoughts and looked up at her. Alice focused on the array of portraits hanging on the opposite wall. Most of them were young women. Clients, Alice supposed.

_ Tick tock. _

“I hope our next session will be more...enlightening. Otherwise, I might be inclined to think you are relapsing,” he said, the lightheartedness of his tone hiding the sinister implication. “Off you go then, Alice.”

Alice rose from the chaise as calmly as possible, despite her body’s instinct to run, and exited the room, holding the door open for the doctor’s next client as she did.

Panic ebbed away to nothingness and the hollowness in her chest returned. She’d survived for one more week, but the doctor’s words echoed in her head, following her like a sinister specter. How much longer could she continue on before she ended up back in the asylum? Before Wonderland was gone and Amelia was no more than a faint ghost in her memory?

_ Tick tock. _

**Author's Note:**

> This was inspired by Alice: the Madness Returns! I was watching a playthrough of it and...well, this happened. It's not something that I'm used to writing, to be honest. Normally, my angst at least comes with a happy ending, but not this time it seems. Anyways, this was written for the Hetalia Monday Challenge and the prompt was "You can run, but you can’t escape.” I hope you all enjoyed!
> 
> Find me on [Tumblr](https://silverphoenixwrites.tumblr.com/), [Twitter](https://twitter.com/sil_phoenix), and [Pillowfort](https://www.pillowfort.io/silverphoenix)!


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